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Proven Profits March 2013

3 Reasons It Pays to Visit Us

Take advantage of reward travel to attend two new grower-focused events here at Four Star.

We get many grower questions during the year and are glad to help with ideas and techniques that work for our operations. But we realized that dedicated time to learning, questions and presentations would offer much more value to growers involved in day-to-day greenhouse operations. That's the reason we developed two new grower-focused events for 2013:

Grower Open House, August 5 — 9; and

Four Star University, Sept. 10.

Teach Your Staff to Avoid Over-Watering

By Dennis Crum, Director of Growing Operations

I believe that far more plants are lost each year to over-watering than to under-watering, yet the people we growers hire are good people who want to do a good job caring for our crops. It seems like many are so afraid of killing plants by drying down that they over-water and kill the plants with kindness. This can cause issues including little or no root growth, high or low fertility levels, various fungal or bacterial diseases, and undesirable plant habit.

There are occasions when a plant care person will severely dry a plant to the damaging level. This situation usually occurs in one of two scenarios: 1) The person has been told to grow drier and pushes the plant too far in the other watering direction or; 2) Due to a rapid improvement in outdoor weather conditions, light and/or temperature levels change faster in the greenhouse than the plant care person can react to the plants' response.

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GARDENERS ARE
INSPIRED BY ...

ColorBlaze® Marooned™Coleus

When Solenostemon scutellarioides ColorBlaze® Marooned™ arrived on my front porch last spring, my first thought was, "Okay, it's a Coleus, and not a terribly exciting one." I planted it up in a large antique metal bowl along with some Osteospermums and put it out by the pool. Little did I know that we'd have one of the most brutal summers I can remember.

I live in northwestern Ohio (Zone 5b), and in 2012, we had weeks of hot, dry weather. But that Marooned was a trouper — and in full sun! Not only did it survive, it thrived beyond belief. It crowded out two of the three Osteospermums and looked more fabulous in that container than I ever dreamed possible. This was no ordinary Coleus.

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